Another is Robert Austin, who changed his views on the issue after discussing it with Happer.

Happer has been attacked verbally over the issue for arguing that scientists need to follow proper scientific procedures in analyzing the threat from man-made global warming.

But he's stuck to his beliefs despite the intolerance from fellow academics, as this excerpt from the article explains:

Happer claims that climate-change orthodoxy has had a chilling effect that has made some junior faculty around the country reluctant to voice support for his position out of fear of hurting their chances for tenure. Austin, however, says that in his experience, the Princeton physics department “has been great” and very tolerant of climate skeptics.

In an interview last year with The Daily Princetonian, Happer characterized hostility toward climate skeptics in harsh terms. “This is George Orwell,” he said. “This is ‘the Germans are the master race. The Jews are the scum of the earth.’ It’s that kind of propaganda.” In an e-mail following an interview for this article, he warns against “the capture of U.S. society” by a “scientific-technological elite.”

The article goes on to describe the core issue in the debate:

Much of the climate-change debate centers on a 2007 statement adopted by the American Physics Society (APS), a leading professional association of physicists: “The evidence is incontrovertible: Global warming is occurring. If no mitigating actions are taken, significant disruptions in the Earth’s physical and ecological systems, social systems, security, and human health are likely to occur. We must reduce emissions of greenhouse gases, beginning now.”

Austin, Happer, and a handful of other scientists urged the APS to rescind this statement in favor of one stating, “While substantial concern has been expressed that emissions may cause significant climate change, measured or reconstructed temperature records indicate that 20th- and 21st-century climate changes are neither exceptional nor persistent, and the historical and geological records show many periods warmer than today.” It goes on to say that other forces, such as ocean cycles and solar variability, also might account for rising temperatures. “Current climate models,” it concludes, “appear insufficiently reliable to properly account for natural and anthropogenic contributions to past climate change, much less project future climate.”

These two aren't the only prominent Princeton profs questioning global-warming alarmism. There's also Freeman Dyson, the eloquent scientist and writer who's been around the campus since the days Albert Einstein was there.

What all these guys are saying, if I may presume to sum it up, is that the alarmism that has grown up around global warming represents the very antithesis of the scientific method - and that we need to separate the politics from the science.

No wonder they're not popular with the politicians. Below is a video of Happer patiently explaining it to California Senator Barbara Boxer, who responds with unbridled ignorance about the point he is making (second video; guess which one is the "climate dinosaur." Hint: Not the scientist).

Just what makes Boxer think she has the intelligence to even discuss this with Happer remains a mystery. She clearly fails to comprehend the point he is making about prehistoric CO-2 levels. What Happer is saying is that the planet once had much higher CO-2 levels with no ill effects. Boxer somehow construes that to mean he desires to see us return to that era. This shows just how clueless politicians can be on scientific issues. It also shows why the global-warming fight is political rather than scientific in nature.

ALSO: Economist David Friedman explains the real issue among the alarmists: They want to tell the rest of us what to do:

From the standpoint of an economist, the logic of global warming is straightforward. There are costs to letting it happen, there are costs to preventing it, and by comparing the two we decide what, if anything, ought to be done. I am fairly sure, however, that many of those who are sure we should be doing something about it do not see the question that way. What I see as costs, they see as benefits.
Reduced energy use is a cost if you approve of other people being able to do what they want, which includes choosing to live in the suburbs, drive cars instead of taking mass transit, heat or air condition their homes to what they find a comfortable temperature. But it is a benefit if you believe that you know better than other people how they should best live their lives—know that a European style inner city with a dense population, local stores, local jobs, mass transit instead of private cars, is a better, more human, lifestyle than living in the anonymous suburbs, commuting to work, knowing few of your neighbors.